After only an hour of instruction, the sixty undergraduate students who participated in the second-annual Math Teach-Off dramatically increased their understanding of a new mathematical concept.
The event, which took place on the afternoon Thursday, March 21, divided students into three teams to see how much they could learn within an hour. First, event organizers administered an initial quiz on the unfamiliar topic of Voronoi diagrams, on which students scored an average of only 27%.
Then, three Math instructors – Ruxandra Moraru, Martin Pei, and Zack Cramer – had one hour to teach their students as much as they could. Once the hour was up, the students took a second online quiz via digital QR code, and then feasted on pizza as event co-founder and Math Faculty teaching fellow Diana Skrzydlo tabulated their results.
L-R: David McKinnon, Martin Pei, Zack Cramer, Ruxandra Moraru and Diana Skrzydlo
“It was a rollicking success!” says David McKinnon, chair of Pure Mathematics and Teach-Off co-founder. “All three instructors were hugely successful, and Zack Cramer came out the winner with a phenomenal 80% average amongst his students!”
Cramer had heard great things from the instructors who participated in last year’s inaugural Teach-Off, and jumped at the chance to try his hand at teaching an unfamiliar concept. “I had never heard of Voronoi diagrams prior to receiving the material for the teach-off, so the first challenge in preparing for the lecture was to learn the math!” he says.
“As someone trained in pure math, one of the biggest challenges for me was understanding the details behind some of the computer science-based applications of the material. Learning mathematics outside my area of expertise was a rare and exciting experience.”
Students and instructors alike appreciated the enthusiastic, interactive learning environment – and the free pizza afterward. “I wish all of my lectures were accompanied by free pizza!” Cramer says.
McKinnon first conceived of the Teach-Off in 2021, hoping to create a fun event while also demonstrating the efficacy of iterative testing to assess learning. As he noted in an article about last year’s event, this kind of learning assessment “is the gold standard in educational research for measuring teaching.”